Best way to store IP adress?

I'm needing to store the IP adress as a variable in my application.
I was then wondering, what the most efficient way of doing this would be?

I would simply make 4 integers, and then in a setter function, read four arguments, and pass them into those four integers, and checking if it is valid for an ip. Ex. int1 = 192; int2 = 168; int3 = 1; int4 = 1;

I imagine than using hex in some way would be best? Whats your suggestion? :D